The Queen's Executioner

by Christopher Mitchell

  Laodoc opened his eyes, his hands trembling. He had urinated, and he noticed that the seat of his trousers felt warm and wet. To his left Simiona was swaying back and forth, her eyes wide in terror, while Beoloth lay prone to his right, unconscious from a blow to his head, blood trickling from his left temple.

  ‘Urgh!’ the woman laughed. ‘He’s gone and pissed himself.’

  ‘Who are you?’ Laodoc said, his voice shaky, as he pulled himself into a sitting position, his back against a carriage wheel. There were about a dozen peasants in front of him, armed with clubs and long knives.

  ‘Are you a councillor, then?’ a man asked.

  ‘I am,’ he whispered.

  ‘Which party?’ asked another.

  ‘The Liberals.’

  ‘We probably shouldn’t kill him,’ the older one said. ‘Aren’t the Liberals meant to be on our side? Didn’t they vote for the heating fuel to be shared with our districts?’

  ‘I was hoping he was a Conservative,’ the woman said, looking disappointed. ‘Then we could have eaten him.’

  ‘We should still string the fucker up!’ another butted in. ‘All politicians are the same. Doesn’t matter what colour you paint gaien-dung, it’s still shit under the surface.’

  A younger man ran over from the right. ‘Soldiers,’ he cried, ‘coming up the road!’

  ‘Let’s get out of here!’ the older man shouted.

  As the peasants started to scatter, one approached.

  He spat on Simiona. ‘Fucking slut, whoring yourself out to these gold-tongued bastards.’ He pulled back his right foot to kick her.

  An impotent fury rose up in Laodoc, as Simiona raised her arms to shield her face.

  ‘Don’t touch her!’ Laodoc tried to shout.

  The man turned towards him, a mocking grin on his face. He pulled a knife from his belt.

  The first crossbow bolt took him in the throat, the second and third buried themselves deep in his chest. He flew backwards, landing sprawled out on the cobbled road.

  ‘Encircle the carriage!’ an officer yelled, as soldiers ran up to where Laodoc sat, their crossbows trained on the fleeing peasantry.

  ‘Councillor!’ the young lieutenant shouted. ‘Are you injured?’

  The officer ran over to him, placing her hand on Laodoc’s shoulder.

  ‘A few cuts and bruises only,’ he replied, his voice high and reedy. ‘Thanks to your timely arrival. Help me to stand would you, my dear.’

  The lieutenant offered her hand, and assisted Laodoc as he gingerly stood. His heart was racing, and he felt out of breath. Simiona also stumbled to her feet.

  ‘Thank you, master,’ she whispered, clutching his arm.

  Laodoc frowned. He had done nothing to deserve any thanks. He looked at the slave, who was glancing over at the body of the dead peasant. The thought of her being hurt appalled him, and he felt himself getting angry again just thinking of the way that peasant had spoken to her. What would he have done if the man had attacked her with the knife? He grimaced in pain.

  Simiona frowned at him. ‘Are you all right?’

  He cared for her, he realised. Not in the way insinuated by that filthy peasant, but as he loved his own sons. Except she needed him, depended on him for every detail of her servile existence, whereas his pig-headed sons required him for nothing. He also knew that she could never love him in return, not while he was her owner, and she a possession. Yet he longed for her love, as a father craves his children’s love, while knowing he had no right to expect or demand it.

  ‘Just a little shaken up,’ he said, his hand brushing some loose strands of hair from her face. He started to cry.

  ‘I think the councillor might be in shock,’ the officer said to Simiona. ‘Let’s get him back into the carriage. We shall escort you home.’

  ‘Thank you, Lieutenant,’ Simiona said. She took Laodoc’s hand.

  He remained silent, not trusting himself to speak. Caring about one of his slaves. How Stoelica and his sons would laugh.

  The lieutenant sat with them on the way home, once the broken glass had been swept from the carriage floor.

  ‘Armed bands of belligerent peasants have been waylaying the nobility with ever more frequency,’ she was saying, as Simiona nodded. ‘The relative light and warmth of the caverns in these quarters attracts them, and then they come face to face with their betters, and are filled with rage and jealously. We’ve had road blocks set up around most of the areas where the nobility live, but there are so many tunnels, and we haven’t enough soldiers, frankly, to keep them all out.’

  Laodoc sighed, as the young officer spoke on. His tremors were subsiding, but he felt nauseous, and had a raging headache behind his temples. He was too old for this excitement, and he yearned for a cup of tea, despite only having his first sip of the stuff a few hours before. He gazed out of the smashed carriage window, watching the soldiers march alongside them.

  The tunnel opened up into an enormous cavern, close to where he lived. Ahead, a soldier from a different detachment was holding up the traffic. As their carriage lurched to a halt, Laodoc saw the reason why.

  Approaching along a road from the left was a long procession of chained Kellach slaves, walking four abreast. Simiona let out a stifled gasp, and the lieutenant quietened, and they watched the slaves march along the road ahead of them.

  There were dozens of soldiers on duty, with crossbows trained on each side of the column, and pikes at the rear to urge the slaves on. The Kellach were in a pitiable state, ragged, filthy, with long red weals down their skin from repeated flogging. They were emaciated, and many were covered in sores, suffering the effects of malnutrition, parasitic infestation and infection. Laodoc blinked as he forced an emotional distance in his mind, trying not to see what was plainly evident before his eyes, trying to recall the way he had previously viewed these people, as savages. Animals. Dumb brutes. It was no good. He closed his eyes, overwhelmed by the intrusion into his mind of a vision of Killop, Kallie and Bridget in that slave procession, and he bowed his head, screwing his eyes shut, and biting his lip.

  Laodoc clung onto his composure. He was a gentleman of Rahain, he told himself, unaccustomed to displaying his emotions in public.

  After an eternity, the carriage lurched forwards, and he opened his eyes. The young officer was looking out of the window, while Simiona was gazing up at him, a sad smile on her face.

  ‘I think,’ he said, forcing calmness into his voice, ‘that our little brush with the peasants has left me feeling rather dizzy.’

  ‘I would recommend, sir,’ the officer said, ‘that you retain a small bodyguard when venturing outside for the immediate future. I know many of your station who have taken such precautions.’

  ‘Yes, perhaps that would be a sensible idea.’

  As the officer continued to talk about possible arrangements of guards, Laodoc’s thoughts drifted back to Killop. What a perfect bodyguard he would make. His size alone would put off all but the most desperate of freezing and hungry peasants. He would become the talk of the city, of course. A councillor with a Kellach bodyguard? Would he be praised or mocked? More importantly, would Killop do it? Would he try to escape if he knew that Kallie and Bridget remained locked up in the secure area of the mansion while he was out?

  He needed to test his idea.

  A hint of a smile edged its way back onto his lips, as he thought of the perfect way.

  Chapter 14

  Silverstream

  Silverstream, Rahain Republic – 26th Day, Last Third Autumn 504

  Shella pulled her coat around her, the heavy flakes swirling through the air blocking her view of the others on the hillside.

  ‘Damn cold,’ she heard Pavu curse ahead of her, as they climbed the rough slope. ‘Damn snow.’

  It had been a shock when it had arrived a few days before, snow being unknown in the Rakanese wetlands. At first some had thought it another ash-fall, but with the volcano scores of miles behind them, Shella had known b
etter. When it had started to land, many had cried and leapt like children, as they discovered the flakes to be merely frozen water, and drinkable.

  The novelty had worn off for Shella, as she trudged up the steep hill. The snow lightened, and passed away, as they reached the summit. The sun was halfway up the eastern sky, and was shining through a gap in the clouds, transforming the snow-covered valley below into a sheet of dazzling white, dotted with the dark marks of hundreds of tents. The trees that had once stood in this valley had been felled for firewood, and Shella could make out the smudges of stump clusters near the fast-flowing stream that rushed through the middle of the camp.

  ‘Quite a sight, boss,’ Pavu said. ‘We’ve made it.’

  Shella shook her head. ‘Let’s just see what Rijon has to say, once he’s done his sighting.’

  She knew the valley would be hard to leave. It had been the first fertile, green place they had seen since crossing the basalt desert, with grass, woodlands, and the bright little river. It had seemed like paradise to many, who were starting to look upon it as home.

  But it was too small. The trees had been cut down, and the local wildlife hunted to scarcity. More importantly, the water supply was nowhere near sufficient for the three hundred thousand refugees that had survived the desert, half the number that had left Arakhanah the previous summer. Looking down upon the densely inhabited camp, Shella realised that Obli had guessed right, when she had spoken on the day the volcano had nearly destroyed them all. It had also been the day when Shella had assumed temporary control of the migration, as Obli was incapacitated by her head injury for almost a third. Even after she had recovered, she continued to delegate to Shella much of the day to day running of the marches and camps, acknowledging her sister’s undoubted expertise.

  Not that Shella had ever felt like an expert in anything, except the dark art of killing. During Obli’s absence, a hand-picked cadre of brutalised mages had accompanied Shella on her endless tours around the camps, quelling trouble and ruthlessly keeping order. And somehow, it had worked. The people had picked themselves up from the barren rock of the desert every morning, and kept walking. Day after day, through agonies of dust and thirst until, finally, they had crawled out into this valley. Three hundred thousand corpses littered their path back to Arakhanah, desiccated and discarded like a painful sloughing off of skin, but the survivors still stood, their dreams of a new home nearly fulfilled.

  Obli was now like a goddess to the migrants, who said prayers daily for her health, and lined up for hours to get even the merest glimpse of her passing. In contrast, Shella was looked upon with terror, and her mages vilified and hated. Shella marvelled at the way her sister seemed to bear none of the responsibility or blame for the ruthlessness of the mage cadre, despite being the one who had given the orders.

  She glanced at the black-robed Holdings man next to her. ‘You ready, Rijon?’

  ‘I am, madam mage.’

  Although she still mistrusted him, she had grown to respect the Holdings man’s strength of will, and the hardiness he had displayed throughout the migration. She had never heard him complain about hunger, or exhaustion, and he had never once refused to perform a sighting for them.

  Shella remembered his previous vision, and the reaction he had provoked, when he had smiled and told them that they were only a day’s march from the valley where they now camped. The news had almost caused a stampede, as the people’s desperation threatened to turn into mass hysteria. In the end, the leaders had stepped aside, and let them run.

  ‘The view is excellent from up here,’ Rijon went on, sitting on a rock. ‘Do you see that ridge on the horizon, to the south-west?’ He pointed. ‘That is the northern end of the great Tahrana Valley that runs between the Grey Mountains and the uplands where the Rahain have their underground cities. I don’t think you want to go in that direction. Directly to the south, all our information tells us that the land lies empty, and there is a place where two tributaries join, forming a wide river that flows all the way to the sea-cliffs. I doubt my abilities will stretch as far as seeing to that distance, but if I can locate the northern tributary river, which runs from the Grey Mountains somewhere ahead, that will give you a target to aim for.’

  Shella sat down next to him. His eyes glazed over, and his mouth opened, as he entered his sighting trance. She pulled a small flask from a pocket in her winter coat, and drank some of the nasty spirits that Sami had procured for her. She grimaced, but the liquid warmed her, and took the edge off the bitter wind.

  The guards on the hilltop with them were standing around in small groups, looking bored. She had left her mages at the camp, seeing no need to bring them all the way up the wind-blasted rock. Pavu stamped his feet, and rubbed his gloved hands together.

  ‘It’s so cold,’ he said.

  ‘Wow, I have a genius for a brother,’ Shella replied. ‘Maybe we could train you to perform some tricks for our entertainment.’

  Pavu scowled. ‘Why must you always be like that?’

  ‘I guess it amuses me,’ she replied, shrugging. ‘At least I can choose when to be a sarcastic bitch. You’re stuck with being stupid.’

  He walked off, huffing.

  Shella chuckled to herself, just as Rijon came out of his trance. He gasped, his head lolling forwards, and Shella held his arm to stop him falling off the rock. She offered him a flask of water, which he took without speaking. He drank, then retched the water back up again, holding onto his stomach in pain.

  ‘I would sell my grandmother for a cup of tea and a cigarette,’ he groaned.

  ‘I have a bag of fire-roasted ants.’

  Rijon retched again, shaking his head in disgust. She laughed.

  ‘How you can eat insects, is beyond me,’ he said.

  She shrugged. ‘They’re tasty.’

  ‘Anyway,’ he said, shaking his head. ‘Bad news, I’m afraid. No sign of the northern tributary yet, for at least five days’ march. I can take another look then.’

  Shella swore.

  ‘On the bright side,’ he said, ‘there are several other streams along the way, and plenty of forestland filled with furry things to hunt, birds to net, and, no doubt, lots of insects for you to enjoy.’

  She nodded.

  ‘May I ask what you’re planning?’ he said, sipping from the water flask.

  ‘Simple, really,’ she said. ‘I’ve amalgamated all of the remaining districts into twenty new ones, and intend on sending them south one by one, each leaving a few days after the previous one, and taking a slightly different route. It’ll take more than a third to get them all moving, but hopefully by the time the last one leaves, the first will already be at this great river you keep talking about.’

  ‘I would imagine so,’ he replied. ‘I estimate it is about fifteen to twenty days south of here.’

  ‘Then I shall have scouts sent out today,’ she said. ‘The sooner we get there the better. We’ll need to set up spawning pools as soon as the first settlers reach the river, to get ready for the flood of children about to arrive.’

  He raised an eyebrow.

  ‘There will be tens of thousands of women down there who will be pregnant,’ she said, looking at him like he was stupid.

  ‘What?’ he replied. ‘Already? But we’ve only been here a few days, surely there hasn’t been enough time.’

  ‘What are you talking about?’ she asked. ‘Are you an idiot? Most of them will have been pregnant since before the migration even started. In fact every pregnant woman in the city without a licence probably joined the march.’

  Rijon looked at a complete loss. ‘I don’t understand, there have been no births that I know of throughout the migration, and I have yet to see a woman that looked pregnant anywhere in the camp.’

  Shella frowned. She had assumed that pregnancy was pregnancy, and that it was the same everywhere.

  ‘Rakanese women,’ she said, ‘can become pregnant, but if they don’t feel the time is right for having children, then th
ey can hold it in abeyance, until they’re ready to go ahead.’

  ‘Abeyance?’

  ‘Yes. I don’t know how else to say it, like in storage, waiting? It can also happen without the woman knowing it, if her body is under stress.’

  ‘Like, say, crossing a volcanic desert?’

  ‘Exactly,’ she replied. ‘Then their bodies can switch it back on again, once the stress has gone. Who knows how many women down there are pregnant and don’t even know it yet.’

  ‘Is there no indication that they are with child?’

  ‘Well, your period stops, that’s usually a bit of a giveaway,’ she said, noticing the Holdings man frown. ‘But out in the desert, many might have put that down to exhaustion, or hunger and thirst, and not realised it was because they were in abeyance.’

  ‘How long can this state last?’

  ‘About a year or so,’ she replied. ‘Then, if the woman still doesn’t want to spawn, or if their bodies are still under stress, the embryos are reabsorbed back into her body.’

  ‘In the Holdings,’ he said, ‘things are much simpler. A woman becomes pregnant, then, if she carries to full term, a baby is born nine thirds later. There are no spawning pools in the Holdings either. These I do know about. What is it? Four thirds of pregnancy followed by a further five in the pool?’

  ‘Yeah,’ she said, relieved he wasn’t completely ignorant. ‘That’s about right.’

  ‘And our women,’ Rijon went on, ‘only carry one child at a time, or occasionally two, whereas for you…’

  ‘A dozen is about average,’ she said. ‘Although numbers in the high-teens are not uncommon.’

  He shook his head.

  ‘Come on,’ she said, as she saw Pavu approach. ‘Let’s go before our asses freeze to this rock.’

  Back at the camp, she went straight to her tent, and finished writing up her plans, while Jayki and Braga waited outside. She gathered up the paperwork once it was completed, and left the tent. She looked around, noticing the camp was quieter than usual, but also that there was a low roar of noise from down by the stream.